Sunday, December 30, 2007

Numbers are said to be Prime if divisible only by themselves and by the number 1. For example: 29. Both 29 and 1 guzzinta 29 but no other Numbers, Prime or otherwise, guzzinta 29. In short, a Number that can't be fucked with, too much. Prime Numbers can be hard-nosed integers and also bad-assed acts, and I witnessed one such bad-assed act this week at Blue Chicago, a fine bar in windy, snow flurry-y, Chicago. There played electric bluesman John Primer, Prime, certainly, on some level, but by definition, Primer, and singing, too. Behind him: drums, bass, harmonica, and keyboards, and beside him for a few songs: another singer, Peaches, belted it out a bitteen like Koko Taylor. Prime Numbers frustrate many possible solutions and Primer Numbers beat back the cold. One only gets divided under certain (like, default) conditions and the latter clobbers your def jam. The bar fills. The Harvey Wallbangers change hands. "I got my mojo workin'," sings Peaches, "but it just don't work on you." Clearly a song about the frustration of long division, although Muddy Waters, himself, would know best, and his ghost presided during that Primer Number. Bad-assed Chicago Electric Blues takes $10 at the door, and rattles the inertia of our sorry, cookie-cutter, mis-managed, mass media, gross airport country. Thank the lord some people & some Numbers have the basic decency to stand apart. Divide that.

Tuesday, December 25, 2007

There may be no greater Demographics than Stoic Muttons. Notice how they always stand to the right, no matter where the camera is placed. You can say PRIME-er or PRIM-er, whichever. You can say inseam or you can say trompe l'oeil. There may be a white boy with a thumbtack and a black boy in the hedge. You may decide to hate artists, or to be safe, you may decide to hate everyone. There is always some joker who cannot navigate a pool party, socially speaking, i.e., cheese-burgers, sun-tans, and fart-powder. "Arousal" and "The Scorpions" are mutually exclusive, such that, it is not possible to experience a reasonable modern arousal while hearing songs played by The Scorpions, an English-singing hair-metal combo from good old Germany, ja ja, die rootin' tootin' und die wienerschnitzel. If it were 1984, you'd be involved in drama outside the Pepperidge Farms store at the strip mall, in the middle of the night. Lip gloss, a clash of foreheads, and a police action. Enjoli: "Unh." Enjoli: "Unh." Them's not no coincidence.

Nope. Them's Demographics. Which can be confused with Healthfoods because both sets are not, in any case, mutually exclusive. Do your duty as a citizen and remember to donate some pisswater well in advance of the Iowa Caucuses. Some political operatives, afterall, will require a blood transfusion. Has anyone ever, at any time, said, "Fisticuffs in the Urals?" or "Buttocks on the Andes?" or "Liposuction beside the Himalayas?" Some Turks battle turds while other Turks battle Kurds. There are Products for what ails you and then again there are no Products for what ails you. The results, in the end, stupefy even the brightest bulbs in the garden. The world, no, does not come in stereo, unless you happen to live nearby a disaster. To whit, there were once pay phones, antennae, and sit-down meals. Every citizen had a snake story. To deconstruct was to slap one's self with another person's hand. "Chug, chug, chug," many used to shout. Planets are no better than junkies. There is Want and there is Must. Which best defines you?

Tuesday, December 18, 2007

I'm sick and tired of people claiming to be members of The Lost Tribe of Israel. If you wake up? In the middle of the night? In the dark? Not knowing who you are? In situations like that? Well, according to Lost Israel Authorities, that alone may qualify you for membership. You'll need proof of illegality in every culture, some bagel money, and a uni-sleeve. Take your application down to Local Diaspora Chapter 104, which meets at Club Babylon, Thursday evenings, as soon as three stars twinkle in the eastern sky. Knock three times on the door. Then repeat this biblical excerpt three times fast: "... And God took a McRib from Adam and created the Guilty Meal, three dollars and sixty-five ought cents, comes with 64 oz. sparkling grape juice and a potato kugel." I can see how it's practical, though, to be enrolled in The Lost Tribe. You get to duck out on The Holocaust, for starters. The regular Tribe of Israel jokes tend to wash off your back. More than anything: Annual volleyball tournaments and BBQ with The Found Tribe of Israel.

Of course, when the two groups intermarry, you get a whole new category: The Lost & Found Tribe of Israel. They've got all kinds of sweater bins, coat bins, wallet bins, hat bins, and umbrella bins in which the rest of us can root around. I've heard of magical treasures turning up in said bins: Well-of-Swearing Ass Warmers; Burning Bush Anxiety Powder; and rare copies of King David's guide to middle management: If you want Her, then you got to put Him on the graveyard shift. It is not, however, politically correct anymore to say The Lost & Found Tribe of Israel. You need to say something like The Directionally Challenged & Recently Discovered Coalition of Holy Would-Like-to-Be Peoples. As you would imagine: Everybody is suing Everybody Else. The Lost Tribe suing The Found Tribe. The Found Tribe suing The Tribe. The Tribe suing A Boy Named Sue. It says in the bible that "For forty days and forty nights, litigation covered the earth." Man, how times have changed. Nowadays we've got high-speed Internet. Dig?

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

There are more obese cats named Pythagoras now than at any other time in History. These cats are not dumb. They have figured out the following relationship: F-squared + cN-squared = LAS (where F = Friskies, cN = catNip, and LAS = Long Ass Slumber). After total war can come total feline obesity. Right now, I would argue that we have only partial feline obesity. Right now, I would argue that we have only partial war. But let's save that for later. I was once a young economist working for a model of American corporate integrity, which I shall refer to, simply, as "Arthur." At Arthur I was called upon to complete many vital tasks, such as (1) develop the final bagel and lox from the main conference room after a client meeting; (2) analyze the score in televised hockey goals of Sweden vs. U.S.A. after the Yanks had yanked their netminder; and (3) research the coffee pot as many as ten or fifteen times per day. This qualifies me to make a few pronouncements on the State of the Economy. It may help, I would argue, to create a couple-two-three new deities: Stockius Tickus (God of the Exchange); Payicles (God of the Salary); and Maalox Maximus (God of Relief). We'll need them in the months ahead, big-time.

Pythagoras, the famous mathematician & geometrician & runway model, came to understand a number of relationships. He is most famous for understanding the motives of the triangle -- why the triangle weeps; why the triangle hates its father; why the triangle sits in its efficiency apartment with the lights out. But he developed other formulae as well, including that for (TW) Total War, which can only be achieved by dumping (TO) Total Ordnance on (TO) Total Others. This theory has come to be known at The TWO and has a cult following in the military. I do believe that we have not achieved The TWO, in that we have yet to dump TO on TO. Of course, The TWO is relative. Soviet TWO and Sino/Wino TWO and Gallic TWO and Aboriginal TWO and Extraterrestrial TWO involve dumping TO on (US) United States as well everybody else but Soviets, Sinos/Winos, Gauls, Aborigines, and ETs, respectively. Pythagoras also calculated the Number of Windows in Baltimore by taking the hypotenuse of the disuse of the hypotension and giving it a wedgie. Nostradamus predicted Pythagoras many years after Pythagoras lived and died. I think that's a copout and shouldn't be forgotten any time soon.

Tuesday, December 4, 2007

As a kid, I always thought that Botulism meant a clinically significant pattern of flubbing -- or "botching" -- plans, tasks, events. I regularly flubbed a few things. Therefore, I thought I suffered from severe Botchulism. I heard that I could die from it; I still flubbed a few things; I kept quiet about these deliberations. Similarly, I kept quiet when my jr. high school took field trips to those terrariums or planetauriums or dinosauria rooms that had the T-Rex rotating domes. I never perceived the constellations the dude with the clicker told us to perceive. Instead of Orion, I saw a crouching prosecutor wielding a baggie of crack. Instead of Pegasus, let's say, I saw an Englishman howling "Cor blimey, me Piles itch me so!" In retrospect, I think it's high time that our constellations get updated, anyhow. I've seen the constellation "Metabolism," up there, in the winter sky, all bloated and whatnot. I've seen the constellation "When Millionaires Sadden," up there, in the summer sky: It is linked by those four summer stars: Birch, Crotch, Butch, Klatsch. The four autumnal stars -- Moustachio, Pistachio, Pastiche, Microfiche -- form the constellation "Lemonjellical," while those same stars, in the springtime sky, form the constellation "Mediocrity: A Personal Voyage."

What the heck ever happened to Moustaches? I don't mean a mustache. I mean moustaches. Used to be you'd open a book and someone, in a uniform with epaulets, would be twirling his moustaches while fingering a blunderbuss, and don't get all double entendre-ish on me; fingering used to be a g*ddamn good word; used to be "one could shoot one's wad at the track" and that would mean exactly what it's supposed to mean. Anyway, those days are gone -- clearly. To our detriment. We're left with, in part, Cell Phone Nation. Caller 1: Hullo? Caller 2: Hullo? Caller 1: Hullo? Caller 2: Yeah. Caller 1: Where you at? Caller 2: Yeah. Caller 1: Hullo? Caller 2: Here. Caller 1: Yeah. Caller 2: Hullo? Caller 1: Hullo? Caller 2: Hullo? Caller 1: Yeah. Or, if you prefer, The Heart. I'm not going to knock Hallmark. I'm not going to knock second grade teachers or rainbows or hair ribbons or cropfields or aunties coming home from a scare. I'm not going to knock straight rhyme. I am, however, gonna knock the so-called "real poets." Each of you "real poets" are hereby entitled to five heart references in your entire oeuvre, your entire "sheath," and one of those must actually represent the medical heart, which I define as the muscle or organ that pumps the blood, chumps, to our oxygen-ass capillaries, damn it. Am I right?

APPEARANCES WITH HETERODYNE IMPROVISATIONAL MUSIC PROJECT

I have appeared several times (as “Words”) with the Heterodyne improvisational music project, which is led by Maria Shesiuk and Ted Zook. Other performers have included Sarah Hughes, Leah Gage, Doug Kallmeyer, Bob Boilen, Sam Lohman, Amanda Huron, and Patrick Whitehead. Here are three free sample recordings, each about 30 minutes long, available on Soundcloud: